Working Searcher Intent Into Your SEO for better Google rankings

SEO is just about finding and using the most popular, competition-light words and working them into your page, right? Right?

Well no – using words with a high SEO rating, but with little relevance to your company is ineffective and just causes a high bounce rate. So too are words that might be relevant, but don’t appeal to the state of mind of the searcher. They might not be ready to buy.

Words, it seems, are not always good for your company even if they rank high on SEO.

So what can we look at instead, to attract traffic who are looking for us with our product on their mind?

What is Searcher Intent, and how does it help SEO?

Searcher Intent is the idea that we should work out what the client is thinking, which words they will search for, when they want what we have to offer.

A person browsing the net might have several types of intention:

Informational intent is when a user is looking to get information about a topic, whether they have a specific question or just want general knowledge.

Navigational intent is when someone is trying to reach a specific site. A lot of branded queries fall under this type of intent.

Transactional intent is when someone is searching with the intent to buy.

With that in mind, now we can work out what people want when they search, then what keyword selection to employ to help them to your services.

How to attract more traffic with Searcher Intent

Keyword selection is still at the heart of it all, and the right words can mean the difference between the searcher finding you relevant or irrelevant to what they intend doing with what they find.

Even within the same niche, one wants to buy, another might just want a good read. Say that you are trying to sell camping equipment online, and also have a blog designed to increase your SEO. This type of site requires different searcher intent for each page. Your blog pages may need keywords that are more informational, like “best camping equipment review.” However, for product description pages, you should use branded keywords or keywords like “camping equipment for Australia.” SEO strategists need to think like a consumer to figure out the best options.

Finding your potential customers’ intent

Sometimes it’s difficult to pin down exactly what the searcher intent should be. While we mentioned how important searcher intent is, we can always fall back on our keyword research and see which keywords are getting the most search volume and therefore the most traffic. When in doubt, research.

The secret ingredient to SEO performance

Searcher intent is one of the most important elements of SEO, but it doesn’t get the attention it deserves. It can not only give you more traffic, but that traffic is more likely to stick and convert rather than bounce.

To make sure that your keyword choices and other efforts are targeting the right type of customers for your pages and sites, it’s essential to make sure searcher intent is being integrated at every level of your SEO planning. A good place to start here is using a full website audit. This will make sure that your efforts are showing the largest results.